Fast…stop to the projects for the garbage of Attica

The government will not budge on the projects for the regional planning regarding the garbage of Attica, but is awkwardly and inactively watching the excesses of Keratea, despite the continuous battles between MAT teams and citizens.

Despite the assurances that the 4 garbage management plants in Attica that promise to solve the problem will be realized via fast track procedures, for now the pace seems more like a fast stop! Not even the auction issues for the competition have been finalized, nor the total cost of the projects that will define the allocation of funds between private interests and the state.

A few days prior to the new inspection by a EC team about the progress of the projects, the contractors are sounding the alarm and maintain that the lost time will not be regained.

Managers of major companies, such as Thanasis Katris of Ilektor, estimate that “the aim of the plants stopped being a realistic one from the moment that the new units will take more than 4 years to be built and there are thoughts of changes in the regional planning!”. He calls upon his experience from a recent plant signed by his company in St Petersburg, saying that it will be ready within the next 4 years with difficulty when the contract has already been signed. What can one say about Athens, where we are still in the process of "consultation"?

Over their dead bodies in Keratea!

As Mr Katris estimates, the only way out is the expansion of the present landfills (ie the one in Fyli) but even this solution has an expiry date according to the European orders. Even the landfill at Grammatiko is halfway through.

In Keratea everything points to the planning literally stepping over dead bodies! The development of the situation has surprised even the most experienced contractors, who confess that they have not met with such resistance before.

On its part, the Attica prefecture boasts about shutting down the third-world dump in Keratea since the area waste has been moved to Fylis since last December after a year-long “punishment”.

«Even if the project starts and is comlpleted, it will never be operational» says Stavros Iatrou, former mayor of Keratea, and adds that the people are angry. «If the project does not have public approval, it won’t proceed».
 
The machinery is just sitting there

The machinery of the contractor has been located in Ovriokastro, where the new landfill will be built, since the morning of December 12, 2010. But the contractor fails to operate it, despite the decision of the State Council that the work can continue.

The new municipality of Keratea, under Mayor Levantis, has picked up the thread where it was left by the outgoing administration, and is exhausting all remedies to prevent the construction of the landfill. 3.000 signatures were collected recently for a petition to Unesco about serious violations of international conventions by the Greek government, focusing on the archaeological findings in the area.

The decision of the State Council regarding the appeal by the municipality for extending the environmental conditions of the landfill, has been set for March 9. Then there are the decisions against the expropriation of the project and the outcome of the appeal by the government against the acceptance of the relief measures by the County Court in Lavrion, whereby the procedures in the specific area were prohibited.